Moon of Destiny

by Lord-Mandrake

Post Galaxia, The Senshi learn the history of the universe before the Moon Kingdom. Powerful enemies and Allies awaken, and destinies are fulfilled

8. Restitution

Chapter 8: Restitution

Lightning arced from the outstretched hands of the taller of the two men that stood in the shadowy room. It jumped from his palms to strike the four figures laying on stone tables a few metres away. Long minutes passed and still the lightning played about the room, its electric buzzing easily drowning out all other sounds. Eventually he lowered his arms halting the dramatic visual display.

The two men watched the four figures closely. This was the most crucial phase of their operation. Time seemed to stand still for the two as the peered intently at their charges. The shorter of the two leapt gloriously and cackled madly when a long moan of pain began to emanate from the tables.

"It's alive, it's alive I tell you, alive!" He screamed.

"Mori?" His companion said with almost no emotion.

"Yea Neko?" The smaller man replied calmly, all former signs of elation and insanity gone.

"You really need to lay off the television. You're getting weirder than usual."

"Yea, sorry about that, it was one of those things that just had to be done."

"No it didn't."

Movement from the tables quickly ended the debate. Slowly and painfully the four figures sat up revealing themselves to be young men. They glanced around the room and quickly shared a look among themselves, before the largest of them, a tall well muscled white haired man, spoke up.

"What happened?" He said in a deep smooth voice.

"You lost." Neko replied.

********

A few hours later the four men sat in front of a large table. The remains of a meal sat before them and they each still held large goblets. Mori and Neko sat sprawled in thick plush chairs that hadn't been in the room all that long ago. The men looked troubled, none more than the most slender of them.

He was the shortest of the four, highly slender and very bishonen. His long blond hair was pulled back in a ponytail tied at the base of his neck. His light blue uniform seemed a part of him, even though his appearance was anything but formal.

"Ten thousand years?" He asked bewildered. "I knew it was a long time, but ten thousand years? That's incomprehensible. Has she."

"Yes," Neko replied coldly, "she's moved on, but that doesn't mean that you aren't needed. All of you have a job you have been neglecting for far too long."

"It's hardly our fault." Another of the men, this one a slightly taller short haired blond in a matching uniform replied. "I tried my best to fight it, but no human could have withstood."

"Oh I don't hold your failure against you." Mori interrupted. "I hold it against the person who kept you from it. In a way though, I'm glad. If you hadn't succumbed to her power, Mina would have never been reborn in this time. If she had never been reborn, I would have never met her. So you see its all for the best." He said ignoring the pained look in the white haired man's eyes.

"The true reason we brought you back wasn't a need for you to defend your prince, or even for the excellent contribution you could make to the team. It was for Makoto and Rei." Neko said simply. "Unlike Ami and Mina," again he ignored the flinch from the white haired, and bishonen blond men, "they haven't moved on. That means you two," he said pointing at the short haired blond and the fourth of the group, a tall muscular long haired brunette, "still have a chance. Of course they don't exactly have pleasant memories of you, and would rather roast you over a spit than look at you, but we'll find a way around that."

The men again shared a look amongst themselves. The world as they remembered it was over. There was little they could do about what had transpired since their capture but there was one thing they agreed on. They would find some way to make up for their mistake.

"Tell us," the white haired man implored, "what exactly has happened since they awoke."

Mori and Neko nodded to each other and beckoned the others closer.

"I am so glad you asked." Mori said with an evil smirk.

"Yea," Neko agreed, "this is much easier when the victim. err recipient is willing."

Without further discussion beams of light fired from the palms of Mori and Neko's hands striking the foreheads of the others. The four men dropped to the ground thrashing in agony at the powerful psychic invasion. Memories tumbled through their heads burning themselves into their minds. Seconds, centuries, eons later it seemed, the agony receded leaving only horror in its wake.

"Kami-sama," the brunette spoke, "what have I done?" His horrified question was soon mimicked by his companions.

"Exactly what you were ordered to do, without thought for right or wrong, love or compassion, duty or honour, or even the people you swore to love and defend. You betrayed everyone and everything you ever loved. Your actions caused the world as you knew it to be destroyed. You four are singly handedly responsible for murdering not only the women you loved, but also the only hope your people had of halting the destruction." Neko said quietly. "That is your sin. That is the crime your failure created. We give you the chance to atone for that, and for two of you to try to win back the person you betrayed most. I can not guarantee your success, but I can give you the chance. Will you try?"

"We will." The four answered nearly as one. Only the bishonen one lagged behind the others.

"Mercury-chan." he whispered softly as a tear ran down his cheek.

******** Ami was quite bored. She had long since completed her every assignment, and even she could only study so much. Neko was with Mori in what they called their 'Spell Laboratory'. You couldn't usually hear the mild accent that the Primarchs had. They learned quickly how to hide such things in order to stand out less, but she smiled at the archaic way they pronounced Laboratory. It reminded her of the old American sci-fi movies.

Choosing to go out onto the balcony to read in the Sunday afternoon sunlight, Ami grabbed her new romance novel and pulled open the sliding door. She stopped frozen in her tracks at the sight that awaited her. On the balcony were cats, dozens and dozens of them. The covered it completely from side to side and front to back, they even took up the narrow railing. The cats were of every age, from kitten to those with grey in their fur, and of every colour imaginable.

She was so shocked by the sight that she almost missed the fact that the raised their heads as one and seemed to nod at her before going back to lounging in the sun. She was quite used to intelligent behaviour from Luna, Artemis and Diana, but seeing strange unmarked cats behaving intelligently had her quickly shutting the door and running for Neko, his request that she not bother him while he was in his laboratory instantly forgotten.

She jerked hard on the closet door that led to the extra dimensional lab and to her irritation found it locked. She pounded hard on it and waited anxiously for either of the boys to answer. Finally as she stared hostilely at the offending door Neko stepped out and secured the door behind him. She savagely suppressed her curiosity at what he was doing in order to tell him about the cats.

"Neko, could you explain the large amount of cats on your balcony. I went out to read and they nodded at me Neko. Normal cats don't nod at people."

"They will at you. One of the little charms I gave you makes normal animals friendlier towards you. It basically makes them see you as one of them. Now just how many cats were out there?"

"Over one hundred if my guess is correct." She said snappishly. She really wished he would tell her things like the anklet making animals like her more, before she found out on her own. It was irritating to no end how secretive he could be at times.

"Oh good," he replied happily. "That group will bring the total number of recruits up to nearly one thousand. I can begin transmogrifying them soon."

"Transmogrifying? What are you doing to the cats Neko?" She asked in a chilly tone.

"Oh, well I'm helping them out. After I learned about the Mau last weekend, I decided to try to bring the race back. I sent a call out to cats all over the world, any that want to undergo the transformation into a Mau should come to me. I figured that it would take longer than a week to gather a thousand, but I'm pleasantly surprised by the number of cats that wish to be transformed."

"You're just going to remake the Mau?" she sounded a little odd. Learning that someone you know planned to recreate a nearly extinct specie could do that to a person.

"Yes, Luna and Artemis are the only Mau I can sense in several dozen light years. In order for the specie to have a future I need to take drastic measures like this."

"Right. Well I'll just go see if Mina wants to go shopping then." She said. Right now even going shopping with Mina sounded better than being anywhere near Neko. It was times like this that she realised the enormous gap there was between what they considered normal or ethical.

"I wouldn't bother. Mori teleported directly to their bedroom from the Lab. You know what those two have been like." He smiled as he said it. "Oh and you might want to stick around today. This afternoon Mori is going to begin teaching Mina our language. I'm willing to bet you'd be interested in joining in, right?"

She glared at him for the foolish question. Nothing in the world irritated her as much as when he spoke to her in Aleph. She hated not understanding something, and she knew he did it just to annoy her. The thought of him not being able to get by with that was almost as much a motivator as the joy of learning something new.

"You knew I'd be interested before you asked, but thank you for inviting me."

"Anything for you, Sprite." He said softly as he brushed her cheek with his hand. "Sedrul laserin Mizuno Ami." He whispered, brushed her lips with a kiss, and made his way towards his bedroom, leaving her there with a smile on her face.

Ami hardly saw Neko at all despite being in his apartment all morning. It was a strange occurrence, and upset her more than a little. She was here to be with him, not to spend her time alone. She knew it was childish of her, but the knowledge did little to dissuade her from feeling that way. By afternoon she had progressed beyond upset and into annoyed. When Neko materialized in the library at around two in the afternoon she was reaching critical mass.

"So you've finally decided to pay attention to your girlfriend?" she asked coldly.

"I'm sorry Sprite. I haven't been trying to avoid you today, but I had a lot of things to do."

"Like you and Mori's mysterious project in the lab?" She inquired aloofly.

"Exactly, and moving the new cat's into their temporary home, and dealing with some paperwork that came up recently. It's unbelievable how much importance your society places on documentation of the obvious."

"You'll simply have to adjust." She said. His explanation mollified her somewhat, but she couldn't resist getting a last little jab in. "And of course you know so much more about modern society than I do that I couldn't possibly have been any help with your paperwork."

Neko wasn't stupid. He knew a trap when he saw one. There was no real way to answer something like that. Any answer would be wrong, one would call her stupid, while the other would say that he hadn't considered asking for her assistance. Neither was a good idea. Luckily he had a perfect way out of this one.

"No Sprite, I didn't ask you to help because of who I was at the time. How would I have explained your presence when I looked like this?" With that his appearance changed into that of a man in his mid thirties. He was obviously too young appearing to be her father, and too old to be anything else.

"Okay, that makes sense." She admitted somewhat ashamedly. "Will you tell me what the paperwork was about?"

"Sure, I was finalizing the change of ownership on this apartment complex."

"You bought the apartment complex?"

"Yep."

"You bought the apartment, and you got them to finalize a title change on a Sunday? How did you manage that?"

"When you can create gems from thin air money ceases to be a concern. I just offered them enough money to motivate them properly."

"Sometimes you frighten me Neko."

"I don't mean to, Sprite, oh and its time for the language class." Ami was out of the room and down the hall before he finished the sentence.

********

"I can't believe you did that Mako-chan." Usagi said sternly.

She stared at her errant Senshi with truly impressive amounts of censure in her eyes. Makoto looked briefly ashamed of her actions, but quickly her face again took on a look of stubborn determination. Usagi sighed at Makoto's expression and once again tried to bridge the gap between her Senshi.

"We did good today even without most of the Outers." She said quickly. "Ami did you learn anything about this enemy before you had to fight?"

Ami smiled at Usagi. She was highly impressed by the amount of maturity and leadership Usagi had been showing lately. Of course she was still angry at Mamoru for his betrayal that had caused such a drastic change, but the change itself was nice.

"Very little I'm afraid." She replied.

"Oh like that's a big shock." Makoto said rudely.

"As I was saying," Ami continued as if Makoto's words hadn't hurt. "The creature seemed similar to the previous two, despite the superficial differences in appearance. Like the Carnaloth and the Yugoloth it was quite resistant to magic. Also like it's predecessors it was incredibly strong and fast."

"Wow, it took your computer to learn all that?" Makoto again interjected.

Ami was beginning to get angry. She understood Makoto's feelings, but this constant abuse was beginning to push even her buttons. She sent a pleading look at Usagi who quickly took control once again.

"That's mean Mako-chan. You know Ami-chan didn't mean to hurt you."

"Like it matters. Are we done here?" Makoto asked abruptly.

"No." Rei replied.

Rei knew what Makoto was going through quite well. She herself was in a similar situation, but Makoto was placing far too much blame on Ami. It was Makoto's own fault that she broke up with Konjou. If she would have stayed with him despite her fears Ami would have never done what she did.

"We have to talk about what we saw Makoto. These things are tough. So far I haven't been able to do more than paralyze them with wards. Only Usagi and Ami seem to be able to hurt them."

"Ami can only hurt them because she's screwing Konjou."

"That's enough Mako-chan." Mina interrupted. She was feeling quite a bit better after the weekend. Luckily the monster had been taken care of before she arrived so she hadn't needed to fight. "I know you're hurting Mako-chan but can't you see."

"The only thing I see is my friends turning against me. Call me if you see any monsters." With that Makoto stormed out of the room.

Usagi sat staring at the door for a few moments after Makoto's abrupt departure. Everyone could see the tears shining in her eyes that Makoto's actions had caused.

"It's ok Usagi-chan." Mina said as she sat next to her. "I know it will work itself out. Mori promised me he was doing his best to help."

"Do you know what he and Neko are doing?" She asked desperately.

Mina looked at Ami and the two of them shook their heads negatively. Despite all of their efforts they hadn't been able to pry even a hint of the boys' intentions from them.

"I'm sorry Usagi-chan." Mina said dejectedly. "I couldn't get a thing out of him about it. All he said was it was under control but it would take a little time."

"Neko told me the same thing." Ami admitted with annoyance. "Any time I tried to get more than that out of him about it he would just become more and more evasive." She didn't bother to mention that if she continued to press he would shut her up with kisses, a fact she had used to her benefit.

"I hope it doesn't take too long." Usagi said casting a furtive glance at Rei. "This could get a lot worse if they move too slowly."

"I know Usagi-chan," Ami said softly, "but there's nothing I can do to hurry them up, or even get any more information. Those two never write anything down." She sounded frustrated by the lack of information.

"Mori says they never write anything down because they almost never forget anything. I asked him once what Lunari was like and he started giving me her life story. He didn't even live with her and he remembered everything Neko had ever told him about her."

Ami nodded at Mina's description. As frustrating as it was, they really had that good of memories. They had no need to write things down so there was nothing for her to snoop through.

"Does anyone have anything else to say about the monster?" Usagi asked hopelessly.

"No, Usagi chan." Mina said. Rei quickly agreed and half a heartbeat later Ami also shook her head. "Okay, well then I guess this meeting is over. Ami if you see Luna or Artemis could you tell them to come to my house. I really need to talk to them."

"Is it okay if I come with you Usagi?" Rei asked. "Grandpa is letting me out of my duties for the day, and I don't want to spend it alone." She sounded a bit sad at the end.

"Sure Rei-chan," Usagi said sounding a little happier than before. "You know you're always welcome, besides I don't want to be alone either." With hugs spread all around the girls parted ways and left in pairs heading in opposite directions.

Ami and Mina began the walk to the apartment. It had only been three days since the language classes began and already they were encountering problems. Ami, who usually picked up even the most difficult concepts quickly, was doing no better than Mina at remembering the simplest of the words and rules. Though three days was hardly no time at all for learning something as complex as a new language, she felt disheartened by her lack of even them smallest success.

"Mina, I have never felt so stupid in my life." She said

"Huh? What are you talking about Ami-chan?"

"Aleph," she replied. "Its much more difficult than I anticipated."

"Oh, I know. Mori said it took Ulterran children decades to be literate. I think were doing very well for three days."

"Mina, can you remember even one word, one phrase in Aleph? Can you pronounce any of them? I can't, and I'm glad he hasn't even shown us what the written language looks like."

"I remember one phrase, and Mori told me I said it almost right. It was 'Sedrul laserin'. That was easy to remember."

"I've heard it and I can tell you what it meant by context, but the literal translation escapes me. It's almost like even though I know I memorized the words, I can't hold the information in my head."

"Sedrul laserin, 'my heart is' Mori says it was one of the ways to say I love you in Aleph."

Ami stopped and stared at Mina. Again Mina had managed to amaze her. It seemed every time she began to think of Mina as a complete ditz, Mina would manage something that once again proved she was more intelligent than she let on.

"How can you remember that, Mina-chan?"

"It's easy. It means 'I love you' so how could I forget it. I am the Senshi of Love after all." Mina flashed a V symbol with her fingers and continued on her way giggling. After only a moment Ami joined in, and they hurried to the apartment.

********

"So Usagi, what do you feel like doing?" Rei said as the two sombre girls walked towards Usagi's house.

"I don't know Rei-chan. I actually have all of my homework done for once, you know that hasn't happened in so long I don't know what to do." She said with a smile.

"Well, we can always watch movies." Rei said.

"Nahh, hey I know, we can do something we haven't done in weeks!" Usagi chirped with happiness.

"What's that?" Rei was somewhat confused.

"We can go visit Motoki. I haven't been to the Crown since Mori and Neko showed up."

"Oh, good idea Usagi." Rei got an evil grin on her face as she thought up a good way to help cheer up her friend. "You know there's no better place in all Juuban to find cute guys." Usagi gave a small grin at the thought, and the pair rushed towards the Crown.

********

Mori walked into the training room and noted Neko's irritation instantly. Today's language class had gone no better than the previous three, but Mori doubted that was the root of Neko's displeasure. The girls were back at the own houses for the time being, but knowing the pattern they had established they would teleport back over later.

"What's up Neko?"

"Mamoru," he replied. "I can't get past the fact that there's more going on there than I know." He glared hard at the innocent heavy bag and hit it hard enough to shake the supports it was attached to. "I know there has to be some reason that Usagi didn't just laugh off the idea that he cheated on her. Usagi is the sweetest kindest girl I have ever met. She'd forgive almost anything. Hell she tried to talk us out of the plan, and get us to join her side. She's got the kindest heart I have ever seen, so why did she have any doubts about the man that supposedly loves her. What kind of moron could even think about hurting her like that?" He was obviously angrier than Mori had thought.

"I have a few ideas from going through the Senshi's memories."

"I saw it from Mako-chan's and Ami-chan's memories. I know what you're talking about, but I doubt that would make her have any doubts about him. She forgave him instantly for every incident."

"Well, there's another way to find out, besides raiding his mind."

"You mean."

"Yes, I can ask the earth. It remembers everything that ever happened on it."

"Do it."

Hours later a slightly weary Mori watched a very angry Neko pace back and forth across the room. If he were a cat at the time his tail would have been straight up in the air. Only his own self control stood between Mamoru and an eternity of pain.

"Well think of it this way. We know for certain that he didn't touch Setsuna."

"He hit her, Mori. You never told me about that." His words were a cold accusation.

"She forgave him for it. He was under the control of."

"It doesn't matter to me. She wasn't attacking him, he attacked her. He struck her for no reason. She's Lunari's descendent, that makes her family to me."

"Neko you really need to calm down. She doesn't care about that, she's upset that she knew Setsuna had a thing for Mamoru. She knew about it but never thought it would be a problem, now she thinks she might have set herself up for this by never talking to them about it. Face it Neko, Usagi is one strange odango."

"I'll talk to Usagi about Mamoru, let her know he's innocent, but I'm going to have a long talk with Mamoru as well. If he ever hurts her again he's just going to disappear."

Neko still looked too irritated to be left alone so Mori took it upon himself to give him something else to keep his mind occupied. He materialized a glowing blade of psionic force in his hand and moved to attack. Neko sensed the swing moments before contact and quickly formed his own blade. For the next several hours they involved themselves in a fierce sparing match. Had they not been using magic against one another one of them might have noticed the small but powerful flare of energy, as it was the war started without them, their total preoccupation with the match blocked out even the feelings of distress from the ones they loved.

********

She appeared in a flash of crimson light. The effect was purely cosmetic but it suited her, and there were very few beings in existence that would question her anyway. As her entrance was in a secluded place in the Minato-ku Park located in the heart of Juuban there was really no one to see it anyway.

She breathed deeply of the fresh flower scented air and stretched her arms above her head, going onto her tip toes in the process. Luckily there was no one to see that. Any male that would have witnessed the sight of her stretching would have likely died from blood loss. She was gorgeous to put it mildly.

She had long crimson hair gathered in a pony tail high up on her head with a white silken ribbon, it billowed down in a cloud of shimmering crimson all the way to her calves. She wore an aquamarine dress that was more a large silk ribbon wrapped around her generous upper body, it dangled down her sides to her ankles but left her slender stomach completely exposed. A very brief bikini bottom like piece of attire the exact same shade as the body ribbon, barely held anything resembling modesty in place. A pair of white sandals adorned her feet. The only other things she wore were a beautiful pair of ruby teardrop earrings and a large red oval shaped clasp theoretically holding the dress bow together. Her pale skin nearly glowed in the evening light and her sapphire blue eyes swept the area with unknown purpose.

She looked no older than seventeen or eighteen, yet she carried herself with complete confidence. She sauntered out of the clearing and onto the path that lead around the park. A few short minutes later she arrived at the side of the lake and instantly drew the eyes of everyone there.

"Oh Kami, look at her." One boy said to his friends immediately upon seeing her, they attempted to bring their tongues back into their mouths but it was hopeless. Her appearance was greeted two ways. Total fascination from every male, and anger from every female.

"I can't believe her, Look at what she's wearing, that's indecent!" That pretty much summed up the female opinion.

Ignoring them all, she walked directly up to the side of the lake and knelt down to trail her fingers in the water. This of course did interesting things to her outfit, causing the back of it to ride up over her hips exposing the fact that her bikini bottoms were very much thong like. Half the males in the park developed spontaneous nosebleeds at the sight of the gorgeous female so blatantly on display.

She began to sing softly as she swirled her fingers through the cool water, still completely ignoring everyone around her. Her voice was a wonderful mezzo soprano, but her words, though melodic, were completely incomprehensible.

The lake began to froth and bubble as she continued her song-like chant and people quickly began to step away from it. A form began to rise from the churning waters as she maintained her song. The basic Juuban resident knew exactly what that meant. A groan of despair echoed through the park as one thing became obvious. The beautiful girl was summoning some kind of monster, which meant that the Senshi would soon drive her away.

The song ended and a being looking like a humanoid with a squid head stepped away from the water and bowed to the girl. She took a moment to look the creature over, as if searching for imperfections. Once she was satisfied that it possessed whatever odd requirements she had for it she turned around and swept seductively towards the exit of the park in the direction of the shopping district. She curled her fingers in a come hither motion over her shoulder.

"Come Oceanus," she said prettily. "We have much to do this evening."

********

Ami sat at the dinner table with her mother. It was the first time in over a week that they had both been home for the evening meal. They had long ago exhausted the conversation topics of school and work and had settled into a companionable silence. Even so something seemed off to Ami. There was a feeling of anticipation hanging heavy in the air. When the attack came, it caught her completely by surprise.

"So how is your new boyfriend Ami?" Her mother asked.

Ami did her best not to choke on her water as she stared amazedly at her mother. She had no idea how or what her mother knew about Konjou, but she was now officially on dangerous ground.

"What boyfriend Mother?" She asked cautiously.

"Well the one you've been sneaking out to spend the night with of course." Mizuno-san said with a positively demonic grin.

"What.umm. What do you mean?" she asked hoping that denial would somehow help her get through this complete crisis.

"Ami-chan, I called home every night in the last week. You never answered. At first I just assumed you were already asleep, but Sunday I came home on my lunch break and checked up on you, Of course you weren't here, and a little of my motherly intuition led me to these." She said producing the box of condoms that Ami had stashed in her underwear drawer.

Ami was torn between anger and mortification. She was mortified to learn that her mother knew that she hadn't been sleeping here, and even more so that she was with a boy, but the idea that her mother had gone through her drawer struck her as a complete invasion of privacy.

"Mother!" she shrieked.

"Oh don't try to turn this on me. I had every right to try to find out where my daughter was, and who she was with. Now, we're going to sit down and have a nice mother daughter talk about your recent behaviour."

Ami knew this would be the worst day of her life. She had never before prayed for a monster to attack, but right now she would gladly rather fight for her life than have this particular conversation with her mother. When she finally joined her mother in the living room the interrogation began.

"So Ami-chan, what is his name?"

"His name is Nekojin Konjou. He is one of the students that transferred to my school during the power crisis."

"And how old is Konjou."

"He's in my grade." Ami said. It wasn't really the answer to the question but it would do. She had no idea what her mother would think if she knew how old he really was.

"Oh good, I originally thought some older boy had taken advantage of you. It makes me very happy that you are of similar age." Ami tried not to whimper. "Now tell me more about him. Where does he live, what do his parents do for a living, those sorts of things."

Ami nearly cried, it was going to be a long night. Nearly half an hour later Ami felt wrung out like a rag. She had needed to do some careful dancing to keep from lying to her mother, and still not giving away anything that would curl her mother's hair. She thought she was home free and was standing when the last question nearly took her breath away.

"I could tell by how well hidden the condoms were that they haven't been taken out in a while, Ami-chan. Are you using some other form of birth control then? Please don't tell me that you are not using any. I don't really approve of you having sex at your age anyway, but if you are going to there is little I can do to stop it." She looked imploringly at Ami when she continued. "Please Ami-chan, take precautions your future is too important to risk like that."

Ami thought about her answer. Mina had said it best when she asked her the same question right after the battle. They knew the future, there was nothing to worry about. She couldn't tell her mother anything like that, but she needed some way without lying that would reassure her that everything was ok. As she was about to speak up, the Mercury computer in her purse sounded a warning.

"You have the loudest pager I've ever heard Ami-chan." When Ami sat there frozen like a deer caught in the high beams of a semi Mizuno-san smiled at her and responded gently. "Well I wouldn't want you to keep your boyfriend waiting, but you will bring him over to meet me tomorrow." It obviously wasn't a request.

She hugged her mother grabbed her purse and dashed into her room. She tore open her computer and stared hard at the readouts. Someone or something was using a truly impressive amount of magic in the park. She wondered briefly what it was about the park that drew monsters, but quickly shelved the concern for later. She was just about to hit the all call button on her communicator when it went off in her hand.

"Minna!" Luna's voice screamed when she hit the answer button. "There's something using powerful magic powerful at the park. Central classifies it as a summoning. We need to get there now!" She heard Rei, Usagi, and Makoto respond of the Inners, and Haruka, Michiru, and Setsuna respond for the Outers. She was troubled by the lack of response from Hotaru and Mina, but there was little she could do yet.

"I'm sorry Setsuna, but I can not in good conscience allow you to join in. Your pregnancy excuses you from your Senshi duties." Setsuna tried to complain but Usagi backed Luna up completely. Setsuna was not about to disobey a direct order from her Princess when she sounded that serious.

"Minna, I'll check on Mina on my way. You know how fast we can move now." Ami said

"Be careful Senshi. The magic source rivals anything we have ever seen other than the Primarchs themselves. I don't know what it is, but it's obviously dangerous."

"Hai." came the response from all the listening Senshi. With that Ami shifted into her Sailor Mercury form and left by her window clearing the four story drop to the ground with no difficulty.

Back in the apartment a dark haired woman stood with her ear to her daughter's door with tears running down her face. Her shoulders shook with her worried sobs as she thought of her daughter.

"Be careful out there Ami-chan." She whispered as she once again resigned herself to the idea that her daughter's life was in the hands of fate.

********

Mina was doing her very best not to fall asleep in her soup. She was helped by the fact that he mother had invited over several of her older cousins, and they were discussing the one thing she would have rather avoided at all costs, her. Yes, she loved being the centre of attention, as long as it wasn't her family's attention. She would have much rather spent the entire night studying with Ami, who was constantly several chapters ahead of the class, or have spiders crawling all over her, then deal with the chattering of her cousins. And the questions.ugh.

"So Mina," a woman her mother's age spoke. "You absolutely must tell me where you met such a cute boy." The woman actually giggled like a school girl. The sound sent shivers down her spine. "Your mother says he's quite handsome and absolutely dotes on you." If she heard the word absolutely from that woman one more time, Mina thought she would scream.

"Oh and he gave you this wonderful bracelet didn't he. Oh isn't it just gorgeous. I can't imagine what you could have done to so turn his head." The lady's expression said that she had several ideas what Mina could have done, and she believed every one of them.

Mina heard her communicator go off, but she was literally trapped by relatives, and was unable to answer it.

"Oh someone's pager is going off. Whose is it.?"

There was a mad dash as all the girls ran to their purses to check if it was their pager. All of her cousins believed they had to be in constant contact with everyone they knew. So even though several of them were housewives they still carried pagers. Several moments later it became obvious that it must be Mina's.

"Oh Mina, it must be Tenjin." A younger cousin squealed. "You have to have him come over and meet us all, you just have to Mina-chan."

Mina knew quite well that it wasn't Mori. He didn't have a communicator, but she would never have a better chance to escape her cousins than this.

"Oh you are so right. Let me just go into my room and call him." She said using her very best airhead voice. The less intelligent they thought she was the better. It made it easier for her to hide her secrets that way.

"Oh you just can't go hide in your room Mina-chan. We want to see you when you talk to him. It's always so romantic to see a girl talking to her first love." Her younger cousin again spoke. Her other relatives nodded in agreement.

Mina didn't bother to disabuse them of the notion that Mori was her first love. If her mother didn't remember how much of a fool she had made of herself in England, then she wasn't about to remind her. She dashed to the telephone and quickly dialled Mori's number. After a half dozen rings when she was sure he wouldn't answer she began to talk as if he had.

"Hello Tenjin." She said seductively. "Oh of course. I missed you too. No I have lots of relatives here right now. No they want to meet you. You can't? Are you sure? But Ten-chan, they really really want to meet you. Really? Ok I'll ask." Mina held the phone to her shoulder and looked directly at her mother. "Mother, Tenjin would like to know if it would be ok for me to go out tonight. He was planning to surprise me with a night on the town, but I never came over like he asked. Please mother, I really want to go."

It took no time at all for the council of females to come to a decision. As much as they wanted to meet him, he had asked Mina out on a date. Meeting the family took second place to something as important as a night on the town.

"Go get ready Mina-chan. I forbid you to miss such an important evening." Her mother told her sternly.

Mina nodded and dashed to her room. She came out less than five minutes later looking as best as she could on such short notice. She had exchanged her blue overalls for a pink skirt and shirt, with a matching pink and white sailor poncho and hat. The effect was overly cutesy but was exactly what she needed to get past her mother.

"Oh Mina-chan!" her mother cried when she came out. "You look so adorable!" She grabbed Mina and pulled her into a hug that quickly had her gasping for air. "Remember Mina-chan, be very careful with him. If you push him too fast you might scare him off." Most normal mothers would warn their daughters about the dangers of boys pushing them for more than was wise for a young girl, but not her mother, no that would be too normal. She got the opposite.

Mina had just made it outside when she saw Mercury leaping from rooftop to rooftop towards her house. She instantly transformed and leapt up to join her.

"Sorry I'm late." Venus said "I had a bit of trouble getting away from my family."

"So did I. There's something going on at the park."

"Why's it always the park?" Venus said as she quickly began leaping towards the oft attacked recreational area.

"I don't know. It might be some sort of nexus of chaotic energy that draws evil creatures." Venus gave her a disbelieving look as she made an easy leap from a house to a seven story apartment across the street. "Or it could just be blind stupid chance."

"I'll bet on the chance." Venus muttered.

They were half a kilometre from the park when they saw the flashes of light. There was no mistaking what that meant. The world seemed to stop around them as the sped up to as fast as they could go. Their friends needed them.

********

Uranus had no trouble at all locating the threat. A gorgeous woman wearing just shy of nothing leading a bipedal squid down the street was something you just couldn't mistake. Cautious of making another blunder, like the one that had set the Primarchs against them, she chose a less hostile way than a world shaking to introduce herself.

She leapt down to the street and began to walk up to the redhead when she noticed Saturn stepping out of a side street just in front of the woman. Saturn stood in front of the strange woman with a completely emotionless expression on her young face. She held the Silence Glaive in one hand with its butt end at her feet, the blade pointing forward at a slight angle. Her bearing was serious and threatening and she barred the strange woman's path. The redhead's response to her appearance was confusing to say the least.

"Oh you are just so cute!" She said as she flounced forward.

She bent over at the waist with her hands behind her back, leaving no doubt in anyone's mind that she was a mammal. She peered at Saturn from a distance of less than a few centimetres, her large expressive blue eyes blink-blinked adding to the overall impression of innocence.

"That outfit is just darling." She said "Oh I just love the little bows, they look so. so cute! And that little skirt, you're so daring to wear something like that at your age!"

"Excuse me." Saturn said. Her tone was somewhat brisk and embarrassed. Her expression had changed through the redhead's perusal. She now wore a look like she had eaten something sour. "I am Sailor Saturn, a member of the Senshi guarding this world from threats, I need to ask you what your intentions are, and why you cast a ."

"Oh, that's terrible." The redhead said. Tears collected in her eyes as she ignored Saturn's sputtering about being cut off. "It's just not fair. Zeryn said I have to get rid of all the defenders because they keep killing the 'loth he sends." She turned her large sad eyes on Saturn. "Please don't be a defender. I don't like hurting people, especially children, but if you're a defender I have to."

"If you are responsible for the monsters that have recently attacked this world." Saturn said threateningly.

"Oh no, I didn't summon them, Zeryn did. I'm Iria of clan Soren by the way."

She looked around noticing that during her talk with Hotaru, that other Senshi had arrived. She noticed two older women in black skirts, one with yellow bows, and the other with aqua. There was a pretty blonde girl with a familiar hair style in a multi-coloured skirt and large red bows, she had wings. A girl with luxurious long black hair in a red skirt glared menacingly at her from a little to the side of the blonde, and a tall statuesque brunette in a green skirt stood of a little ways from the rest.

"Oh, are all the defenders of this world girls?" she wondered aloud. "Zeryn will be very mad if I kill don't kill them" she said out loud, obviously talking to herself. "But on the other hand if I accidentally kill any of our kind. Oh it's just so confusing!" she pouted. Even her pout was overly cute.

Everyone had heard enough by that point to be certain that this girl was definitely up to no good. Talk of killing the defenders, namely them, erased any pity from everyone but Sailor Moon. The situation had degraded such that the Senshi were simply waiting for Sailor Moon to give the word and they would set about eliminating this threat. They were confused to say the least when Iria began to cry.

"Oceanus they want to hurt me!" she wailed. Her tears streamed down her face. "They're just meanies, I want you to get them all!" she commanded and stomped her foot prettily.

Confused the Senshi may have been, but they were veterans of far too many battles to be caught by surprise by the squid after that. The thing raised it's arms and facial tentacles and wiggled them in the direction of Neptune. She barely managed to dive out of the way before something passed through where she had just been. Whatever the attack was, it was silent, invisible, and caused no collateral damage.

"Look out Mars!" A voice screamed from the rooftops. She didn't question who it was at the moment, she just dived out of the way. She felt a massive wave of psychic energy brush her as she didn't quite clear the attack zone, but her training allowed her to quickly shake off the resultant dizziness.

Uranus ignored the squid. In her opinion it was always better to take out the main problem and deal with the minor ones later. The girl, Iria, had summoned the thing. In Uranus's mind it was perfectly clear who was the bigger threat. She now regretted her earlier hesitation, had she simply attacked when she first saw Iria she might have taken her by surprise.

"Space Sword Blaster!" She screamed. She had no intention of using anything less than her most potent attack. She had no idea how powerful Iria was, but Luna had said it was bad. The amber blade of force leapt from her sword and instantly closed the distance to Iria. She had no time to evade, and no time to defend. The blade bit deep into her side creating a terrible wound.

"Owie!" She screamed prettily. She looked down and he wounded side and sniffed sadly, her tears doubled in quantity. She made an absent motion with her hand then poked the cut on her side. She shrieked again at the pain it caused and looked at Uranus with accusation in her tear filled eyes.

"You didn't have to cut me." She pouted. "I wasn't going to hurt you. You wouldn't have felt a thing. Now I'm not going to be so nice to you anymore." Uranus's next attack impacted on a barrier that she couldn't see. Things were about to get ugly.

The squid took another hit from Mars and still seemed hardly slowed. It showed signs of having been hit by all of the present Senshi save Saturn and Uranus. Despite the burns, and electrical charring, the moderate bruising and its wet and slightly tattered clothing, it still continued its attacks. No one had yet been unlucky enough to be caught by the full force of whatever the invisible attack was, but all of them now had received close calls.

Jupiter was in trouble. The thing seemed fixated on her for the moment. Her electrical attacks seemed to have the greatest effect on it, and it didn't look happy about it. She jumped out of the way as it once again wiggled its tentacles at her and came down hard on her ankle. Her landing was totally off, and she could feel her ankle twist inside her boot. She fell to her knees in pain and the creature again began to wiggle it tentacles.

On a rooftop within view of the battle a short argument was taking place. Four men huddled in the shadows created by the low wall that ran along the buildings edge. Three of the four seemed intent on keeping the last from leaping down and intervening, they weren't having much luck.

"You can't. You heard Mori and Neko. She wouldn't want your help. She'd probably ignore squid face and focus on killing you instead." The short haired blond tried to reason with him.

"I know, but I will not allow her to be hurt or killed. If my sacrifice can save her then so be it. It will have been ordained by the." He was saying before Jupiter's scream of pain from the fall interrupted him. He was at the edge of the building in less time that it took to blink. Only the lightning fast reflexes of his bishonen companion kept him from leaping to Jupiter's aid.

"Think about it." The leader of the group said. "If you go to her now you risk not only your own death, but ours as well. Neko made our instructions clear. Do nothing that would compromise us. If you must interfere do it subtly."

After only the barest of instants the brunette nodded, turned to observe the scene once again, and released a swirling light blue ball of energy. It struck a sign hanging on the side of the building above where Jupiter and the squid battled. The sign was torn loose by the force of the explosion and fell to the street below, right onto the squid.

"Masaka!" Jupiter exclaimed as the sign slammed into her opponent.

Mars arrived a heartbeat later and helped her to her feet. Moon was still extracting herself from the undignified position she had fallen into when the squid had forced her to leap into a dumpster to avoid its attack. Neptune was dashing towards Uranus, who looked troubled, and Saturn stalked purposefully towards the redhead, her Silence Glaive was glowing ominously.

"Thanks Mars. If you hadn't brought that sign down on it I would have been a gonner." Jupiter said.

"I didn't do it Jupiter. I wasn't fast enough, I'm sorry." Mars said worriedly.

"Then who did?"

"I don't know, but the attack came from a rooftop over there." She said pointing in the direction of a clothing boutique on the edge of the current battlefield.

Uranus knew she was in trouble. She had fired at least half a dozen attacks at the shield Iria had erected around herself. They had all been completely ignored. Iria busied herself with healing the wound on her side with a spell. She whimpered in pain as badly at the healing as she had from the attack that had caused it. Uranus glanced around and saw that her companions were still trying to deal with the squid. She watched it ignore another hit from Mars and again attack Jupiter. Iria's voice drew her attention back to her own situation.

"You know," she said sounding like a slightly bratty fourteen year old, "I really didn't appreciate you hurting me like that. That was rude and mean. What did I ever do to you?"

"You are a threat to this world, I will not allow your wanton acts of destruction to continue." Uranus said sounding far more confident than she was.

"And just how do you intend to stop me little mortal?" Uranus immediately got a bad feeling. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up as the girl raised her hand and pointed a single finger at her. The invisible barrier around Iria rippled slightly and she began to speak. Uranus knew the barrier was down. The only chance for her to hit Iria would be while she attacked.

"Space Sword Blaster!" she screamed at the same instant that Iria spoke.

"Perrella Logennai." She spoke in a sing song voice.

The amber crescent of energy met a prismatic lance of energy less than a quarter of the way towards Iria. Uranus's attack was obliterated by the multi-hued light and Uranus had no chance to get out of the way. The beam pierced through her shoulder feeling like a sword of pure fire. She howled in agony and fell back away from the beam.

"You see little mortal, your magic is really no match for mine. I would have done my very best to kill you without pain, but you hurt me, and I don't like that."

"You will like this even less then." Saturn said as she stepped in front of Uranus's fallen form. "Silence Glaive Enhance!"

A ripple of power emanated from the tip of the blade of her weapon. The wave slammed downwards around Hotaru and cracked the pavement around her before rolling across the ground in an expanding ring of force.

"Holy shit!" The short haired blond on the roof exclaimed. "That's Sailor Saturn. Mori didn't say anything about her being awake."

"We will do out job regardless." The white haired man replied. He looked at the bishonen and his words carried unmistakeable authority. "If she begins to cast her Death Reborn, take the Glaive from her."

"Hai." The Bishonen replied, knowing he had just been ordered to his death should that event come to pass. He had no fear of dying if it would save Sailor Mercury. Without her in his life there was no real reason to fear anything.

"Where are Mercury and Venus?" The brunette asked. "They should be here by now."

"I can feel them moving this way." The blond replied. "They will be here soon. I just hope its quick enough."

Back on the battlefield below them a staring contest had developed between Sailor Saturn and Iria. Iria could easily sense the incredible power contained in the small girl. It was obvious that if it were all released at once, something she knew the girl was probably capable of, then they attack would be truly monstrous. It would more than likely scour all life off the planet, the two of them included.

"You wouldn't really use something like that big nasty Glaive on pretty little me would you little girl?" Iria asked with big sad eyes.

"In a heartbeat." Saturn replied coldly.

The other Senshi were beginning to form up around them, though none would step in between the two combatants. Moon and Mars helped support Jupiter, keeping her weight off her injured ankle. Neptune cradled the injured Uranus, she also did her best to keep Uranus from again attacking Iria.

Iria cast a look over the Senshi, always keeping the deadly Sailor Saturn in the corner of her vision. She noted the magical fields surrounding them and with a simple act of will penetrated the Glamour hiding their true appearances. A flicker of movement from underneath the fallen sign gave her another option besides temporary retreat.

"Come now, little girl. You really don't want to kill all these people do you? I promise you that we have no interest at all harming the people of earth. They don't matter in the least to us."

"Then why were your monsters killing people?" Moon interrupted with her angry question.

"Well they do so love to kill things. It's the only thing that gives the poor dears and pleasure at all. Besides, it was the best way to draw you out." Iria answered, being careful not to look at her servant that was slowly extracting itself from underneath the sign.

"What do you want with us?" Mars asked angrily.

"With you? Nothing, but a few of you have something Zeryn-chan needs so bad." She simpered. "Zeryn needs some silly crystals to help him bring back our race. We're almost the last of our kind. You wouldn't kill me for trying to save my people would you?" she said looking at Saturn.

"If it places the lives of the people of the earth, or my Princess in jeopardy, yes I would."

"How about we make a deal?" She said suddenly happy.

"What deal?" Moon replied cautiously.

"Well, since of all the people here only you," she said looking at Moon, "have one of the crystals. Maybe you can just give me it and I'll go away. I mean the other crystals I can sense are around here somewhere, but none of you have them. I promise I'll ask the people that have them nicely."

"No deal." Saturn replied.

Jupiter Winced as she let go of Moon and Mars putting her weight on her foot. They would need their mobility again in a moment it seemed. She readied herself for combat as best she could, and silently wished that Mercury and Venus would hurry up. No matter how angry she was at Ami, they needed the power those two now held more than ever.

Mars reached behind her back and withdrew an ofuda. She had little hope that this girl would be affected by it, but it never hurt to try. Besides, she thought she'd had better luck lately with her spiritual powers than her magic.

Moon watched the tense staring contest with worry. She knew that Hotaru wouldn't release her forbidden attack as long as there was hope, but it was hard to believe that when she seemed so serious. If Moon hadn't been wearing elbow length gloves she would have chewed her nails in nervousness. Iria smiled in a not very nice way and whispered something, she vanished.

"Serenity-hime, Look out!" a voice called from the rooftop.

A crushing wave of psychic power smashed into her instantly driving her to the brink of unconsciousness. She was vaguely aware of a shadowy figure taking hold of her and leaping to the roof. In her quickly fading vision she could see four shapes and heard a dimly familiar voice.

"My apologies Serenity-hime. I didn't notice the threat until it was too late. Rest assured that your Senshi are handling the squid."

She made some sound that could have been agreement, or thanks and gave up the fight for awareness.

"That's it. I'm doing something. I won't just sit here and allow Mars to get hurt. The blond said irately. He rocked his shoulders back and clenched his hands. On the street below them several of the many cars parked on the curb started without any apparent reason.

"This is not the answer." The white haired man said in an attempt to regain control of the situation.

"I am sorry," the bishonen said, "for once I agree with him." He gestured at the blond. He quickly spun and after briefly surveying the battlefield, ignited the fuel in the tank of yet another automobile, this one right next to the squid. It was caught in the explosion and thrown twenty metres from its starting point. It had just rolled to its feet then the Toyota hit it at 70 kilometres per hour.

"What in the hell is going on?" Jupiter yelled as the once orderly battlefield descended into total chaos. Moon was gone, taken to the roof by Tuxedo Kamen after she was struck by the squids mind attack. Iria had vanished, but Jupiter doubted that she was actually gone. Saturn had just healed Uranus, and neither seemed completely aware yet. Neptune stood over them like a mother hen guarding her chicks. She and Mars and backed up against one another for protection and the others had yet to arrive.

"I don't know," Rei replied, but I have a bad feeling about all of this. I wish Mercury and Venus would hurry up. I know Venus likes to be fashionably late, but this is ridiculous."

"You called!" Venus yelled from a light pole across the street. "Sorry about being late, but traffic was hell." She said with a quirky grin that could be seen from where Mars stood.

"Yes, we are a bit later than I intended," Mercury spoke from directly above them on her own pole, "sorry about that. Allow me to make up for it though. Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!"

The blue streamers of energy swept forward and struck the struggling Squid. It was obviously very hurt by then. It hardly managed to put up any kind of feeble defence against it. The squid was swept backwards into the side of a nearby building and simply lay there.

Venus wasn't about to give it time to recover from its wounds. Before Mars or Jupiter could even begin to gather their powers to attack she hit it with a powerful wave of her own energy.

"Rolling Heart Vibration!"

The squid never stood a chance. It had been battered, burned, blasted, electrified, cut, and even ran over with a car. Venus's attack was simply the last straw. It dissipated like mist and vanished under the force of her power. Mina was still grinning at her success what the prismatic beam of force blew her off the light pole and knocked her several blocks down the street.

"You bitch!" Iria screamed. As she once again became visible. She stalked towards the fallen and groaning Sailor Venus. "You killed my Oceanus-chan. I've had him ever since he was a tadpole. Do you have any idea how mad that makes me!" She screamed.

Mars and Jupiter each launched their attacks towards the redhead. They combined in mid flight into something far greater than the sum of its parts. The red lightning bolt burned into Iria's back and she once again screamed in pain and rage. Less than a second later Neptune and Uranus's attacks impacted her throwing her across the street and into a wall, which promptly collapsed on her.

"Mercury, check on Venus." Uranus commanded as she finally finished getting back to her feet. Saturn simply glared at the pile of stone. It was obvious to her that Iria was far from finished.

Mercury leapt across the massive distance separating her and Sailor Venus. She landed neatly at her side and quickly began checking her injuries. Venus was in bad shape. She looked only moderately injured. A few large bruises and a bit of cranial bleeding from where she had hit the ground so hard, but the scanners told a different story.

Venus was obviously dying. She had so little life energy in her body it was amazing that she was still breathing. Ever since she had healed Mori it seemed that she just couldn't fight like she used to. She needed to get Venus out of here and back to Mori in a hurry. She had almost teleported the two of them using her butterfly charm when the fallen wall exploded.

"You!" Iria screamed enraged as she glared pure death at the outer Senshi. A wave of her hand and a guttural incantation knocked everyone within forty metres to the ground. "I'll deal with you in a moment. You two on the other hand killed my pet. You die now. Perrella Logennai!"

There was no time to complete the teleportation. Ami readied herself to try to shield Mina with her own body when the blue dome surrounded the two of them. The multi-coloured lance of force struck the shield, and the shield shuddered with the impact. The hemisphere began to shrink as it lost the battle for dominancy with the beam but it held out just long enough for the car Iria never saw or heard to hit her. The beam and the shield cut off at the exact same instant.

Iria was hurt, she was more wounded that she had ever been. These mortals were far more powerful than the stupid 'loth had led her to believe. Knowing that Zeryn would be mad at her for failing so utterly she teleported away, but not before she learned something important. The girl she needed was named Usagi, she was the key.

"Are you okay?" The bishonen asked his leader.

"I will be fine with a bit of rest. The woman's spell was far stronger than anything I have even encountered before. It would have overcome my shield had it not been for your timely intervention." His last words were directed at the blond.

"Your welcome. I suggest we get out of here before the Senshi come looking for the Princess. You know Mori and Neko's orders about that." There was general fierce nodding and the four men teleported away. Seconds later Mars leapt to the roof where Moon lay, she was startled by the lack of Tuxedo Kamen's presence, but something else caught her eye. Still falling in the fading light of the sunset was a handful of Sakura. Something about them struck a deep familiar cord of fear within her.

"Minna I have to get Venus back to Mori. He may be the only one who can save her. Everyone head to their apartment." Mercury yelled.

"Wait Mercury." Saturn yelled as the little girl actually sprinted over to her. "Take me with you, I know something He needs to learn, it might make the difference between life and." Mercury teleported the three of them and Saturn's statement was finished in the dojo of the Primarchs apartment ".death."

"Neko! Mori!" Ami yelled as she pounded on the door to their warded training room that they used when they were feeling too destructive for the real world. It was one of only two places she couldn't teleport into. If she showed up in the dojo and Neko wasn't here that was where he was.

The door jerked open and a tired grinning Neko pulled her into his arms. He was sweaty, showing just how hard they had been working, and he tried to kiss her. He was very surprised what she slapped him away and screamed for Mori.

"What's wrong Sprite?" Neko asked. When his eyes fell upon Mina's downed form, and a very concerned looking Sailor Saturn he dashed back into the subspace room and pulled Mori out behind him a half of a second later.

"Mina-chan!" Mori yelled.

He crossed the space to her faster than anyone's eyes could track. With one touch her knew just how bad off she was. Her life was hanging by a fraying thread. His aura blazed to terrible life, as he thought of the vengeance he would extract on the person responsible for her injuries and exhaustion.

"Mori-san, listen to me." Hotaru began. He didn't seem to hear her. "Mori-san, this is important." He still didn't appear to notice her. "Mori!" she screamed and smacked him across the face.

Neko winced at the action and quickly stepped between Mori and Ami. The fallout from what Hotaru had just done could easily lay waste to a decent portion of Juuban. For an instant Mori seemed to struggle with himself, before he regained control, his aura withdrew into him, and all motion stopped.

""What Hotaru-chan?" He asked. His voice nearly cracked with the strain of not exploding into a rage.

"I know a way for you to save her quickly, Mordred showed me, but you have to be the one to do it."

"I know what I need to do, Hotaru-chan. I can easily imagine Mordred showing you that."

Hotaru fought hard not to blush or yell at him. She understood how he could have jumped to the wrong conclusion but it didn't help the current situation.

"No Mori," she said, "sex is too slow to save her now. Mordred knows another way to transfer power. He has been using it on me ever since the battle. He said its much slower to build my maximum tolerance, but can easily and instantly re-energize someone that has been drained to as much as they can hold."

Mori stared at the girl in awe and wonder. She held the answer to all of his needs. If he could get Mina back up to the point that she was at before she healed him, then no amount of these little battles would drain her.

"Tell me." He said simply.

"I can't tell you, but I can show you if you link your mind with mine."

Mori didn't hesitate. He linked as quickly as he could. Hotaru's mind was far more orderly than he would have expected from a little girl. Instead of having to blunder around learning all manner of unimportant and time wasting information, Hotaru consciously led him to the right memory. Within less than a second of the link beginning Mori had shut it down and sprinted towards his room carrying Mina gently in his arms.

********

The other Senshi arrived Minutes later. They came by way of the balcony on Mori's side of the apartment. When the group of five young women arrived they could see a low golden glow through the bamboo blinds on the sliding door.

"Should we just go in?" Usagi asked. "It looks like Mori is in there."

"Hold on." Makoto said. "I've walked in on those two before, let me check and see if they're decent first."

Makoto pulled open the door a crack and looked in. She quickly saw that though Mori was decent, Mina lay nude on the bed her Senshi fuku no when in evidence. The glow came from Mori slowly tracing his hands over her. Makoto could see that Mina was still unconscious and could feel the energy pouring from Mori's hands into Mina from the doorway. She pulled the door closed and faced her friends.

"Well, Mori's decent, but he's healing Mina, you don't want to go in there."

"He's healing her?" Usagi said happily. "Oh good I was so worried about Mina-chan. Why wouldn't I want to go in while he's healing her."

"Trust me, you just don't want to."

"~It's ok Makoto~" Mori's voice spoke into her mind. "~I have Mina covered now.~"

"Oh correction, Mori says come in."

"I didn't hear anything." Haruka remarked as Makoto pulled open the door.

Mori sat on the bed next to Mina, who was covered up to her chin by a golden silk sheet. She was still asleep, but they could tell she was beginning to come around. Usagi quickly knelt down next to the bed and put her hand on Mina's forehead.

"Poor Mina-chan, she's just been so tired lately."

"I think I have that fixed now Usagi. She should be ok from now on." Mori replied.

"Really?" Usagi asked hopefully.

"Yes."

"Oh thank you!" Usagi cheered. She pulled Mori into a hug and kissed him on the cheek.

"Hey Usagi, that's my boyfriend you're kissing. Get your own." Mina said weakly from in between the hugging pair.

"Mina!" Usagi squealed and gave her friend a tight hug.

Once Usagi let go Mina look at Mori strangely. She had a funny little half smile on her face, and a devious glint in her eyes. She smirked at Mori, and he knew he was in trouble somehow.

"You know Mori, usually when I'm naked in your bed we don't have company. Is there something you wanted to tell me about?" Usagi turned redder than she had ever been. Makoto and Michiru were almost as bad. Uranus laughed so heard she fell down. Rei on the other hand looked sad.

"Oh you know me Mina-chan." Mori said in a truly wicked tone. "I've always wondered what rabbit tasted like. And the rest just couldn't resist a party, eh Rei-san?"

Haruka was now laughing so hard at Makoto, Michiru and Usagi's expressions that she was crying. Usagi was simply beyond words. Her face had reddened so much that she was very much in danger of passing out. Rei collapsed on the end of bed in shock, earning a comically raised eyebrow and a suggestive wink from Mori, which sent Makoto fleeing the room.

"See, I told you Rei wanted to join in." Mori said smugly.

Rei's mouth was working like a fish out of water. She didn't think this joke was funny at all. She knew there was something she should be saying, but couldn't for the life of her remember what it was. When he leaned over Usagi's fallen form to kiss Mina, consequently pressing a very mortified princess between their bodies, the correct word clicked into Rei's mind.

"Hentai!" she screamed at the top of her lungs and quickly began to strangle Mori in her embarrassment. Of course in her violence she neglected to realise that by strangling him she also ended up in the pile of people. By the time she realised her mistake she was half laying on Usagi with her arms around her choking a grinning Mori.

"Ara!" Michiru said and slumped to the ground next to Haruka.

"You said it." Haruka agreed once she got her laughing under control. "Where's a video camera when you need one. The look on Rei's face is priceless.

The mortified Miko and her princess quickly disentangled themselves from the knot of people and darted across the room to stand in the corners, as far from each other and everyone else as they could.

"Mori can you get me some clothes." Mina asked with a smile. "I think we've had enough fun embarrassing the others."

"Okay Mina-chan."

"By the way Mina-chan have I told you how much I love you lately? There aren't very many girls that could hear their boyfriend say something like that without getting angry." The other girls nodded in agreement, especially Usagi.

"I can because I know you love me." Mina said with absolute confidence. "Besides, what makes you think I'm not curious about what rabbit tastes like?" Her comment returned Haruka to her laughter and nearly had Usagi leaping back out the door.

A few minutes later the eight girls had gathered in the front room. Rei, Usagi, and Makoto took up one couch while Haruka and Michiru claimed the loveseat. Mori and Neko each sat in their favourite chairs, while Mina and Ami sat in their respective boyfriends' laps. Only Hotaru sat alone, she half lay on one of the beanbag chairs.

"So did anyone think to tell Setsuna and the cats?" Haruka asked.

"I notified the cats." Neko said. "I even asked them to bring Mamoru. Something has recently come to light that has a bearing on his situation."

Usagi looked wide eyed and hopeful at Neko's words. She prayed that he would have something to prove Mamoru innocent of cheating on her.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Makoto asked throwing a covert glance at Usagi.

"Yes."

Not long after the doorbell rang, announcing the arrival of Mamoru and the cats, before they even became situated Setsuna teleported into the room. Everyone stopped and stared. This was the first time the full group had gathered since the battle. Setsuna declined the invitation of a chair and awaited the discussion. She wore a slightly haughty look, and stared down any of the Senshi that dared to meet her gaze.

"Who wants to start this?" Mori asked.

"I will." Hotaru replied.

"I was in my room with Mordred when he suddenly looked up at me and stated that there would be a monster summoned in the park in a few minutes. I know better than to question a statement like that so I went looking for the rest of the Outers. They of course weren't home so I transformed and headed out on my own. I was halfway there when the call came." She paused and looked around at the rest of the Senshi before continuing.

"Once I neared the Park I saw an unusually dressed redhead escorting a squid headed humanoid. I attempted to ascertain her intentions and through her words it became obvious that she had summoned the monster, and that she worked for the person responsible for the other monsters, which she referred to collectively as ''loth'." She noticed that she had Mori and Neko's full attention, and the looked far from happy.

"The woman who then informed us that her name was Iria of clan Soren apparently read our intention to attack from our minds and ordered her monster to attack." Hotaru halted her explanation with that.

"Iria of clan Soren?" Neko asked with deadly iciness in his voice.

"That is correct."

"Hotaru-chan?" Mina asked.

"Yes?"

"You sound creepy when you get in a serious mood, do you know that?"

"I do now." She said with an infinitesimal smile

Haruka now took up the description. It was clear that she had had the most direct interaction with Iria.

"She was fast, but no where near as fast as I've seen any of you four move." She said indicating Ami, Mina and the Primarchs. "She summoned some sort of shield, but before it was up I hurt her pretty severely with the Space Sword." Mori nodded at that. He knew just how powerful that attack was. Even Neko would feel something like that.

"She healed herself somehow once her shield was up, then she got angry. She hit me with some kind of magic I've never seen before. It was a beam or rainbow coloured light. She said something to make it happen, but I don't know what it was. It sounded a lot like your language to me."

"It was Aleph." Ami said with authority. "I heard her cast the same spell on Mina. She chanted the words Perrella Logennai, and the spell manifested itself as a."

"Fourteen centimetre thick beam of prismatic light," Neko interrupted. "It possessed both raw kinetic and cutting force. It should have burned through any defences you tried to put in its way. The spell translates to Prism Lance. It was made by one of Mori's students about a quarter billion years ago. Trust me it's a nasty piece of work."

"Yea what he said." Haruka muttered.

"Someone helped us out in the battle." Makoto said.

"What do you mean?" Setsuna asked. She may have been taken out of action by her condition, but that didn't mean she couldn't help with the analysis. She had ten thousand years of experience and a tremendous amount of knowledge the other scouts couldn't even begin to touch.

"Well, first I landed wrong and twisted my ankle pretty bad. The squid thing was about to let me have it with its tentacle waving but someone blew a sign off a building and smashed it." She smiled at the memory.

"Wait, the squid thing, did it look like this?" Mori asked before conjuring a very realistic Illusion of the creature.

"Yes." The girls all quickly agreed.

Mori and Neko shared a very disgusted look before returning their attention to the girls.

"Illithid." They said in unison.

"What's an Illithid?" Usagi asked.

"The squid thing." Neko said with a sour expression. They aren't very fast, and they sure as hell aren't pretty, but they're resistant as all hell to most forms of magic, and they have some nasty psychic abilities."

"That definitely describes the squid." Rei said flatly.

"I'll assume the sign didn't kill the Illithid. They don't really have any bones, just cartilage, it wouldn't have been too severely damaged by that." Mori added.

"No it lived, it even managed to use the distraction Iria gave to take Usagi out of the battle. We finally killed it though." Makoto said.

"OK did anything else unusual happen?" Setsuna asked. This battle review was too disorganized to be of much use.

"Well," Rei said, "there was someone dressed like Tuxedo Kamen that showed up and took Usagi out of danger after the Illithid knocked her out, and then there were the cars that started moving around on their own that ran over Iria and the Illithid."

"Do not forget the energy dome that protected Ami and Mina when Iria attempted to finish them off." Michiru spoke for the first time.

"This is very strange." Setsuna said. Those actions sounded suspiciously familiar. She could only think of one group of people that had powers capable of that, but they were all very dead. The Senshi had seen to that personally.

"I wasn't at the battle." Mamoru spoke. "I don't know who was dressed as me, but I never even felt Usagi in danger."

"I wonder why that is?" Setsuna said obviously perplexed.

"I can offer a guess." Ami said.

"Oh, do tell?"

"The rift that has formed between Mamoru and Usagi might be affecting their bond."

"It never has before." Setsuna said. Mamoru flinched at the reminder of his previous behaviour.

"True, but I would be willing to venture that this instance is far more severe."

"Can you not talk about me as if I weren't in the room?" Mamoru growled. "You know forget that. I'll just leave since the meeting is obviously over." Mamoru stood and prepared to leave when Neko interrupted him.

"Sit down Mamoru."

"What?"

"I said sit down." There was no question that it was a command.

Mamoru's face reddened with anger. In the last month his life had gone to hell. He had been beat on several times, lost the woman he loved, been told he was the father to a baby of a woman he had never touched, and even his friends were treating him like he had the plague. As far as he was concerned it was all the fault of these Primarchs. He didn't know how they had managed to worm their way into the Senshi's trust, but he was done taking any of their crap.

"Just who the hell do you think you are?" Mamoru shouted. "I will not take orders from some thing. I was defending the Senshi long before you came along, and I'll defend them after they realize what you truly are and destroy you. I don't know how you've managed to get them to trust you, but you can't fool me I know what you are." He said coldly. "No matter how human you make yourself look I will always know the truth. You're nothing but monsters that need to be destroyed." He spat. "I will never take orders from something like you!" Mamoru made it less than a step towards the door before he found himself floating out of reach of the floor walls or anything else he might have used to manoeuvre.

"Monster?" Neko asked mildly.

Ami shivered at the tone Neko used. It was far too pleasant for what he had to be feeling. She was fairly sure that Neko wouldn't take backtalk from a human very well. Mamoru had to know that. Why in the name of the Kami he was trying to provoke Neko was completely beyond her.

"I think I like that term for me." Neko said still with a smile on his face. "You see, in the time I've been awake, I've done quite a bit of research into the human languages. I find the term monster to be rather enlightening really. Do you know what it means? Probably not really." He casually floated off the ground to hover a few feet away from Mamoru. "The word monster, which you use as an insult, means something not human. That part is obvious, but the part you seem to miss is that it means something that treats humans like humans treat everything else. Think of the things your people call monsters. Oni, yoma, aliens, wild animals, or anything else that humans can't exploit, you think it's a crime for anything but a human to defend itself. If the creature is bigger or stronger, or in our case has more power than you, then it must be destroyed. It's stupidity like that, which puts your specie in such danger." He smiled at Mamoru, who had a sick look of comprehension on his face.

"Here's another thought, Mamoru. Your friends and advisors, the Mau, would be considered monsters by most. Why, you ask yourself? Because they can think, they can talk, they can communicate, your pathetic little specie is of the opinion that you are the greatest creations of the Kami, and anything that doesn't conform to your idea of what is, must be destroyed." Mamoru looked truly ill now, but Neko wasn't quite done. "Lastly you believe that being human makes you inherently better, that nothing anything else could do or say should compete with your own whims, but you forget one tiny detail. The woman you so profess to love isn't human. She's like I am, a thing to you, a monster, something that should be destroyed, according to your own words. I hope that makes you feel proud."

Neko teleported back to his chair and resituated Ami onto his lap before abruptly cancelling the levitation spell he had placed on Mamoru. Mamoru, who was far too busy realizing the magnitude of his errors to be prepared for it, fell heavily to the floor.

Mamoru looked up directly into the tear filled eyes of Usagi, and knew true regret. His words were hasty and brought on by rage, but Neko was quite right about the way most people thought. He needed a way to prove to Usagi that he had not meant anything against her when he had called the Ulterran monsters. With this mistake added to the rest of his problems, Mamoru felt like going back to his apartment and drinking a gallon or so of drain cleaner.

The room was silent. The Senshi sat contemplating the discussion that had just transpired. Never before had anyone other than Usagi looked at it from that point of view. Most people thought she was simply soft hearted and overly trusting, the truth was she tried her best to look at things from the perspective of her opponents. Like with An and Al, they had been misinformed, their actions were horrible, but were humans any better? They had preyed upon the life energy of their victims, feeding it to their tree so that they could survive, whereas humans fed upon the bodies of plants and animals absorbing the life energy indirectly. It all led back to the same thing.

"I think I'm going to be sick." Makoto said as the implications of all of that hit her.

"Try not to take it so hard, minna." Mori said. "It's not your fault you do what you do, and trust me you come by your arrogance honestly. The Ulterran were the most arrogant creatures the universe has ever seen. You have nothing on your ancestors, remember that."

"May I go?" Mamoru asked sounding somewhat polite.

"If you want to," Neko said, "but if you do you'll miss something you will personally find very enlightening." He grinned at the dumbfounded expression on Mamoru's face. "Mori, I think its time we got our oldest cousin's attention."

"Oh you are so right." Mori agreed with an evil grin.

Mori and Neko began to chant together in Aleph, after a few seconds the air began to ripple and Lor appeared looking shocked. He whipped around to glare at Mori and Neko, who only waved and continued with their evil grins.

"Sorry about the summoning." Mori said sounding anything but sorry. "But you see, we know what happened now, and you really need to be here for this."

Lor looked at the perplexed expressions on the faces of the Senshi and Mamoru, and sighed with resignation. There was no way for him to escape when both Mori and Neko were working together.

"Fine, lets get this over with. I was busy at the onsen when I felt the pulling."

"Why would that matter?" Haruka asked with irritation. "You can bathe any time."

"True, but there is a cute little brunette there right now, and unlike you all she does not know that I am really a guy." The Senshi growled with disgust at his flagrant perversion.

"Any time now, Lor." Mori said glaring at the taller man.

"Fine," he said with resignation, "it is really quite simple and I have no idea why you have not figured it out already. Though Endymion is the father of Setsuna's child, he never touched her."

"I've said that all along." Mamoru muttered. Setsuna simply sat there with a stony expression.

"It continually amazes me how many problems could be sorted out, or simply avoided if you people would simply swallow your pride and talk to one another. Setsuna knew that Mamoru and she were not lovers, but did any of you ever ask her? No, you people felt you had no need, the evidence was all there in front of you. Setsuna could have spoke up on her own, but did she? No, she felt that you should have trusted her." He looked at Setsuna and sighed. "Oh do get that disgusted look of your face, I know what you are thinking ten minutes before you do. I have been with you for your entire tenure as Sailor Pluto after all."

"The truth is," he continued, "I am the one that impregnated Setsuna." That admission got the full attention of everyone in the room. Setsuna looked at him in complete disbelief. "No, I am not the child's biological father, but I am the one that caused its conception. It is rather simple. I can not have children to the best of my knowledge. Setsuna has always wanted a child. So I granted her deepest wish. She now has a part of Endymion all to herself."

Usagi glared daggers, at Lor. The Senshi, especially Mina looked ready to kill. Setsuna's expression was complete disbelief mixed with blind hatred, and incongruently, wonder. Mamoru had already transformed, not to Tuxedo Kamen, but to Prince Endymion, and he was eyeing his sword dangerously. The entire situation was so tense it was a wonder the magic had not already started to fly. The sound of laughter, cold and mocking cut through the tension nicely.

"Oh that's cruel." Mori said still trying to suppress his mirth.

"You." Setsuna said to Lor coldly. "I have guarded the Time Gates for ten thousand years, by what right do you..."

"Excuse me." Neko stated calmly interrupting Setsuna's building and very well justified rant. "But I have to know something. You said you spent ten thousand years guarding the Time Gates. Now just to make sure we're all on the same page here lets clarify that. By the Time Gates you mean A large white marble looking doorway, it's in a shadowy misty place with nothing else, and has some probably indecipherable, to you, runes carved into it, is that right?"

"Yes, but I hardly see."

"These gates?" Neko snapped his fingers and the Time Gates instantly materialized in the room next to him. He ignored the gasps of shock from the Senshi. "Am I correct Setsuna? Are these the gates?"

"How. where." Setsuna sputtered.

"Let's play a little game Setsuna." Neko said with a demonic grin. "You like games don't you?" He walked to the other side of the Time Gates from Setsuna and knocked gently on the carved wooden door that barred the portal. "Knock knock." He said still smiling.

Setsuna glared at him, she had no idea how he had moved the Gates here, but there was no doubt in her mind that these were them.

"Come on Setsuna, the game isn't any fun if you don't play. Knock knock." He repeated.

"Who's there." She growled. She didn't know where he had learned of this juvenile American joke, but she had a bad feeling about what was happening.

"Yura." He supplied.

"Yura who?" Setsuna was not happy, she knew this was going to be bad.

"You're a moron for guarding a stupid door for ten thousand years." Neko said. "Let me ask you a question Setsuna. When you send someone through the 'Time Gates' do they come out the other side? Do they appear backwards or forwards at the 'Gates" themselves, or elsewhere? Can anyone time travel without going through your ever so important 'Gates'?" He glared at her when he said that. "The gates are a door, Setsuna. You of all people should know that. If you stood in their presence for that long, how in the name of the Kami did you not notice that the magic you used came from the staff? Were you able to use the door without the staff? No."

"But what about Chibi-Usa?" Usagi asked.

"Chibi-Usa?" Neko looked at her in confusion. It took several seconds for the appropriate memories he had gleaned from Ami and Makoto to surface. "Oh that's easy, the stupid key only worked when Setsuna allowed it to right? It didn't control the gates, it just allowed Setsuna here to know where you were to bring you to them and send you on your way. Chibi- Usa no more snuck past her, than you did."

"But."

"Trust me Usagi-chan."

Usagi looked around the room seeing total disbelief etched into the faces of her Senshi. Only Ami and Mina seemed to believe Neko. Lor and Mori on the other hand looked at the disbelieving Senshi with humour. It was obvious that they believed Neko, and for some odd reason, so did she.

"I believe you." Usagi said in a small voice, eliciting a gasp from most of the Senshi.

"The 'Gates' were a gift to Kronos." Lor said. "I, and anyone able to cast the appropriate magic, can time travel without a medium like that, but I knew that Kronos's line would soon lose their powers. In order to utilize the Garnet Orb his descendents would need a host for its power. Any archway would have worked, but the 'Gates' have one unique special power. They can be called to you."

"It took me a few days to create a large enough subspace pocket to put it in, and the summoning method was only known by myself, Kronos and the other Primarchs. He was supposed to teach his children, but obviously somewhere along the line someone made an error." His grin was wry.

"You see Setsuna, do you understand what that means?" Neko spoke. "You spent ten thousand years, standing alone in something like what you keep you henshin rods in, for no reason other than your ancestors screwed up. You'll excuse me if I don't find your dedication to that particular duty as anything more than a sick joke."

Setsuna stood in the room, experiencing nothing but a desire to disbelieve what she had learned. Her entire life had been a lie. She had wasted ten thousand years guarding something that was completely worthless. Nothing could have prepared her for the betrayal she felt. Setsuna fell to the ground in tears.

"All that time, wasted." she wailed. She looked up at Lor, the being that had created the Gates, the being that had given her ancestor the Garnet Orb, and as far as she was concerned, the architect of her pain. "Why?" she asked between sobs. "Why would you do something like this? What have I ever done to deserve this pain?"

"I did not cause your pain, Setsa-chan." Lor said gently as he bent down to brush her tears away. She flinched away from the touch of his hand and raised her eyes to him. "I gave you what you always wanted. We both know how rarely it is that someone gets their hearts desire, and nothing is ever as beautiful in reality as it is in our imaginations."

"No wonder Setsuna is happier in Crystal Tokyo, she doesn't have to waste her life separated from everyone and everything she cares about. Thank you for telling her Neko, now Setsuna can be with her friends." Usagi responded

"Um, not to be picky or anything, but can we get back to Lor getting Setsuna pregnant." Haruka said. She didn't sound happy at all.

"Hey, yea, that wasn't very nice. No matter why you did it. Why did you let us blame poor Mamo-chan?"

"Is it my fault you jumped to conclusions?" Lor asked.

"You had the duty to take responsibility for your actions." Hotaru said in a chilly tone.

Lor just shrugged. He really didn't care what the mortals thought about him.

"Ohhh, that makes me so mad. I'm glad no one will ever do anything like that once I become queen of Crystal Tokyo." Usagi said with an injured tone. "I'm sorry for blaming you Mamo-chan."

"It's okay Usako." Mamoru crossed the room and did something he had missed more than anything, he took Usagi into his arms.

"Um, not to interrupt this oh so touching scene, but something you just said sent a chill down my spine." Neko said cautiously. "Why will 'no one ever do that' once you 'become queen of Crystal Tokyo'?" he asked.

"Because, everyone will be good and nice."

"Riiight, you'd like to think so." Neko replied.

"But they will," Usagi pleaded. "I'm going to cleanse all the evil out of everyone so everybody will be good and happy and nice."

The room went so silent you could have heard a pin drop in Beijing. Neko looked at Usagi with a horrified expression as the implications of her plan hit him. All colour drained out of his face as he looked at the little princess.

"This is not a good thing." Mori said softly.

"Usagi," asked in a strangled tone, "just how pray tell are you planning to achieve this oh so noble goal?"

"With the Crystal, I know I can do it because when I went to the future, everything that wasn't broken by the war was beautiful and nice. Even the Black Moon family said I did a good job cleansing everyone that didn't choose exile instead."

"Exile? You mean everyone that doesn't get 'cleansed' will be exiled off the planet?" Neko asked, his horror growing by the second.

"Well I don't really want to, but I guess it's the only way to protect the people that got cleansed from the bad people." Usagi said with a frown.

"Usagi, would you come here?" He asked with a high tight voice.

Usagi scrunched her face up cutely and nodded. She walked over to Neko wondering what he needed her for.

"Okay, what do you need?" she asked once she was standing in front of him.

"Right, just stand there a second. Don't move." His right arm was surrounded with a bright silver light. An answering glow surrounded Usagi and an instant later the Silver Crystal appeared in his hand.

"Hey!" Usagi yelled.

"I'll take that, thank you."

"But, that's my Crystal."

"Oh no little bunny, do you remember who made it? It's my crystal, and you just told me you were planning to abuse its powers."

The rest of the Senshi were already on their feet and had transformed, they were ready to attack. Hotaru had the Silence Glaive glowing with power, and Rei had produced something that had disappeared after their battle. She had the Moon Sword. Of course it was worthless against him, but Mori was taking every precaution against it.

"Return the crystal to Usagi." Hotaru said in her unemotional Sailor Saturn threatening voice.

"No, you can do your best to kill me for it, but the only thing you could possibly do is piss me off. Mordred isn't here to restrain me, and I can guarantee you that every Primarch agrees with this decision. Usagi, I was more than happy to allow you to continue using the Crystal, until you told me what you truly intend. What you plan on doing is disgusting. It's nothing short of rape. There is only one thing that separates you from ants, Free Will. Your idea would rob all humanity of the ability to choose between right and wrong. The balance of the universe would be seriously disturbed and you don't even want to imagine what that would cause." He shuddered at the thought.

"Mordred has only two jobs. Two reasons for him to wield power beyond anything even we," he said obviously meaning the rest of the Primarchs, "can truly imagine. His most notable job will be to herald the end of the Universe. He is the being that will return everything to the primordial darkness. He has another job however. He is the judge, jury and executioner of imbalances. If he were to sense something like the abomination you plan to perpetrate, he would wipe the human race off of the cosmos in an instant. There is nothing you could say to prevent that. You have just shown me beyond the shadow of a doubt that you and the specie you protect are far too immature to control the power of this Crystal." Neko shook his head in disgust.

Hotaru thought back to the discussion Mordred had had with her and her guardians following the battle. He had warned them what would happen if Neko learned of the plans for Crystal Tokyo, of course he was correct. Hotaru knew for certain that Neko was not lying about Mordred's responsibilities, if anything he might have underplayed them. She returned the Silence Glaive to a resting position, she would not be a party to attacking Neko and dooming the human race to extinction.

Haruka also clearly remembered Mordred's warning. She shivered at the implications of Neko's words. Usagi would have unknowingly doomed the entire race to oblivion. She had difficulty understanding one thing though. She knew, not believed, knew that Crystal Tokyo would happen, but how could it come to pass without the Queen wielding the Sliver Crystal? She noticed Hotaru stand down from attack position and copied her. Without Sailor Saturn involved they had no chance at all of defeating Neko.

Michiru watched the emotions playing over Haruka's face out of the corner of her eye. She would never tell her lover it, but her face was easy to read. She knew exactly what Haruka was thinking about, the same things troubled her. She had listened carefully to Mordred, she knew beyond the shadow of a doubt he would erase humanity, and not even feel the smallest pang of regret. He would simply be doing his job. Neko was also doing his. She found it difficult, almost impossible in fact, to fault his actions. She herself had been troubled by the plans Usagi had for the founding of her kingdom. Still she owed her Princess all of her loyalty. She hardly restrained herself from crying out in shock when Haruka stepped back, when she finally noticed that Hotaru had also withdrawn she knew they had lost this battle. Michiru joined her fellow Outers.

Setsuna was the only Senshi not to power up. Lor's gaze held her fast. She beyond anyone had worked the hardest towards Crystal Tokyo, she would not give up the dream she had fought so long for. Yet she couldn't seem to do anything while Lor looked at her. She was shocked when his voice slipped quietly into her mind.

"~Do not even think about trying to intervene Meiou Setsuna. I will not have you throw away not only your own life, but the life of the unborn child you carry within you. I have withdrawn my support from your use of the Orb for now. It will not respond to your call.~"

With those words it was over for her. She had no offensive powers without the Garnet Rod, and all of its powers apparently came from the Orb. She was helpless now. Setsuna lowered her head and began to weep once more.

Of the four Inner Senshi only Rei was truly ready for combat. Mina stood staring imploringly at Mori, Ami hadn't even transformed, and Makoto, though in Senshi form, seemed highly reluctant. Rei on the other hand held the Moon Sword, and had no qualms about using it on Neko. Almost every enemy they had encountered had eventually gotten around to trying to take the Silver Crystal. None had succeeded yet, and as long as she still drew breath they never would.

She knew that Usagi's idea edged very close to mind control, but Usagi was the Princess. Whatever she needed to do to assure peace and tranquillity in the kingdom, and for the human race in general, Rei would support. If people needed morality poured into them, how was that any different than punishing people for committing evil acts? At least with Usagi's way no one would be harmed. The evil acts that would otherwise bring punishment down upon the perpetrator would never be committed, sparing both the innocent victim, and redeeming the criminal all without either ever having known.

She was shocked when first Hotaru, then Haruka and Michiru backed down. When Setsuna put her head in her hands and began to cry, Rei became scared. Ami and Mina obviously noticed the Outers surrender and simply sat back down in their chairs. Only she and Mamoru, with Makoto being marginal, stood with Usagi.

"How can I help people without the Crystal?" Usagi said softly, tears ran freely down her face.

"I will give you something to replace what I have taken, Usagi-chan." He said gently. "But I can not allow you to do what you were planning. The repercussions are too severe."

"But I've seen the future! I know what it will be! Crystal Tokyo has to happen." She cried.

"No." Lor said in the iciest tone anyone had ever heard. Hotaru's threats against Galaxia and Nehelenia sounded like a kitten purring compared to this. "What you saw was a paradox. Crystal Tokyo can't happen unless her daughter from the future comes to the past. She was needed to allow Mistress Nine to completely assume control of Hotaru, and she was the one that gave Hotaru the will to regain control. She was the being that forged the mental connection to the imprisoned Elios, allowing you to achieve your current power. She could not exist without the events that her own actions caused coming to pass. Her presence in this time also gave you the assurance you needed to persevere despite the horrific odds you faced. You knew deep in your hearts that you must win, because the proof of your victory was there with you all the time. That is true paradox. I am the true guardian of time. Setsuna stood nominally in my place for an eon, but she succumbed to the pressure and manipulated events to her own liking. I can guarantee you that Crystal Tokyo as you know it will not exist."

"No!" Usagi cried. Something miraculous happened. Without the Crystal, without having transformed, using only the power that she held within herself, Usagi became Princess Serenity. She pulled with all of her will at the Crystal she had pinned all her hopes and dreams on through her many trials. It was hers by right, he mother had given it to her. It was her salvation, her very life. She commanded it to come to her.

The Crystal sat like a lump in Neko's palm. He went so far as to open his hand to show its total lack of response to her plea. Tsukino Usagi, Princess Serenity, the young woman who would have one day been Neo Queen Serenity, had lost. She collapsed to the ground once again Usagi and simply stared at Neko with hurt accusation in her eyes.

"I'm sorry Usagi-chan, but I can't allow you to destroy humanity, and that is what you would do."

Neko looked at Mori and Lor. They seemed to communicate quickly and wordlessly amongst each other. An instant later Mordred appeared in the room and the four of them began to chant softly. No two of them spoke the same words, or even at the same speed, but the sound seemed to blend together perfectly. A point of light appeared in Neko's other hand. The Senshi could feel a slight pull, like what they felt when Usagi needed them. For several minutes the Primarchs continued to chant, while the pull on the other Senshi grew ever stronger. Only Mamoru was unaffected, he didn't even realise that something extraordinary was occurring, he was completely occupied with trying to comfort his disconsolate Princess. Finally even he could no longer ignore what was happening, as the magic flared to a level on par with the energy he had channelled into the unsuccessful attack on Neko using the Golden Crystal. He looked up, at the termination of the chanting, just in time to see the light coalesce into a crystal bracelet.

"Usagi," Neko said as he knelt down to the crestfallen girl and pressed the bracelet into her hand. "I know you're upset right now, but listen to me, this bracelet will grant you the same power you have drawn from the Crystal. This band contains more power than you ever drew from the crystal. It doesn't have the ability to allow you to make the same mistakes you would have with the other, but its power is far easier to channel." She put his finger under her chin and lifted her eyes to meet his. "~Usagi-chan, your ancestor Lunari was like a daughter to me, but after I went to sleep, and with only the best of intentions, she committed crimes with the crystal that were terrible beyond compare. I can not allow that to happen again. To activate the power of the bracer, you only need to will it.~"

Neko looked around at the sombre group and sighed. There was still one last thing he needed to do here, and he could only hope the Senshi wouldn't overreact.

"Luna, Artemis, I need to see you for a moment."

The Mau slowly and carefully stepped over to Neko. They wondered what he wanted with them, and hoped it was nothing serious.

"A terrible wrong was done to you." Neko began. "The crescent moon marking you bear is an abomination. Originally your kind bore a different mark, one that separated you from the common felines created by the Kami. At one time long ago your race was also Ulterran. There were countless different shapes that the Ulterran took, yours was one of them. When your kind was saved by Usagi's grandmother she changed them. In order to allow them to fit in more with her society she bonded you to the Crystal. It suppressed much of your natural instincts and made you loyal to its bearer. In exchange you gained very slightly increased intelligence and greatly lengthened life spans. If you desire it I can undo what has been done to you. You don't have to be afraid of losing what you gained. I promise you the benefits from the change will be maintained, but the mark than now holds you in thrall will do so no more. Your instincts will return, and you will no longer have to fear having your mark covered, it wouldn't do you any harm."

Luna and Artemis didn't even need to think. They were being offered the best of both worlds. All the benefits they didn't even realise were part of Serenity's gift, and all of the freedom their kind had enjoyed for eons. They agreed without even bothering to talk to each other about it. Neko began the process of taking the bond apart and the Senshi looked on in wonder.

"I didn't know." Usagi said still sitting on the floor. "I never thought about why evil was. I thought we had to stop it."

"On the small scale yes." Mordred said as he sat down next to her. "The struggle between good and evil is one of the primary balancing forces of the universe. Struggle creates change, change fuels growth, growth promotes life. If you take out one piece the whole thing falls apart."

"I'm sorry." Usagi said still crying. "I'm so sorry."

With her words a pink swirl appeared in the air above the floor. Mamoru, who had seen this phenomenon before looked in terror at Lor. If that was what he believed it was there was about to be trouble, big trouble. Lor would be very unhappy. He didn't want to see Lor unhappy. He had met more than enough unhappy people today. His worst fears were realized when Chibi-Usa fell out of the portal and onto the floor of the apartment.

Lor immediately fell to the ground in pain, Mordred stared at the pink haired girl in frank disbelief and Mori just shook his head. This was going to be bad.

The first thing anyone noticed was that Chibi-Usa wasn't very chibi. In fact she looked considerably older than she did the last time they saw her. When she had gone home last year she had looked no older than eight years old. This girl was at least fourteen. Her hair was nearly as long as Usagi's and done in her typical cone shaped style. Her build was remarkably like her mother's, from the top of her head, to the bottoms of her feet. Only a slight difference in height, and the obvious colouration separated the two.

"You!" Lor growled as he got to his feet. "You are a paradox."

Chibi-Usa yelped and cowered behind Mamoru. She didn't know who that man was but he was very scary. She wasn't sure what a paradox was either but he said it like it was a bad thing, so she responded in the best way she could.

"I'm not a paradox, I'm a princess."

That statement alone proved to anyone who missed the rest of the clues exactly whose daughter she was. No one other than Usagi could have come up with an answer like that.

"You may be a princess but you're also a paradox, Pinky. There's only one way to deal with a paradox."

"Hey who are you calling Pinky you loser!" Chibi-Usa shouted at Lor from the dubious safety of behind her father.

At the same instant Mordred had finally recovered himself and simply laughed. "Wait Lor. Don't erase her. You're going to love this one."

"Eww that's icky. He's like ancient." Chibi-Usa retorted.

"Not like that bunny brain." Lor responded. "He was talking about the situation, not the bimbo."

Chibi-Usa was in a quandary. Her parents weren't standing up for her like they should be. He father never allowed anyone to talk to her like that. Her mother should have been zapping the tall guy by now, instead she was curled up on the ground. There was something very wrong with this picture.

"Mom, dad?" she questioned. "Hello, royal princess to Odango Atama." She looked around at the rest of then Senshi for support, and found none. "Ok what happened here? Pu snatched me up out of a very nice dream and tossed me through a portal. She didn't even give me my key to get back. Any idea's here people?"

"Your timeline no longer exists." Mordred said simply. "One of the only major changes between the new timeline and yours is the lack of your presence. She reacted the only way she could to save you."

"And you know this how, Red?" She said with utter contempt completely not noticing the evil glare Hotaru gave her at the tone she used on Mordred.

"I know everything." He said simply.

"Oh really then."

"Elios." He replied.

"What abo."

"Curry, You really should think up something harder." He said with boredom.

"Ok Wh."

"You own father, which is sickening by the way."

"Masaka." Chibi-Usa whispered.

"I take it this is the infamous Chibi-Usa?" Mori asked.

"Yea, what's it too ya?" She replied.

"Oh you're nothing like your mother." He responded.

"Thank the Kami." She fired back.

"I don't think I'm going to like you, but you are the answer to a problem that I encountered." He faced Mamoru, completely ignoring the pink haired nuisance for the moment, and addressed his concern. "You are the current possessor of the Golden Crystal correct?"

"Yes." Mamoru said cautiously.

"And it was given to you by Elios?"

"Yes."

"Oh good, that makes things much easier. Now do you accept the fact that Lunari is the primal ancestor of your bride to be Tsukino Usagi, one time wielder of the Silver Crystal, the would be Queen of Crystal Tokyo."

"Yes." Mamoru had a bad feeling about this.

"And finally do you acknowledge that Neko was the adoptive father of said Lunari, and therefore head of their clan."

"Ummm I guess."

"Excellent. Neko, I need to get the Golden Crystal back into Earryn's family line before its lack allows his line to fade. Will you consent to engaging your however many greats granddaughter to my servant?"

"Oh of course. I'd hate to be responsible for the death of one of the last Ulterran lines."

"Perfect, I'll gather the errant would be groom."

"Hey wait a second!" Chibi-Usa yelled. "Did you just give me away to some boy I've never met? Just who the hell do you think you are?"

"That's twice today I've gotten that same question. I'll be nicer to you. I'm your forty something greats grandfather, creator of the Silver Crystal, and the head of your clan. Arranged marriages are far from uncommon, and in fact still the norm among Ulterran. You are Ulterran as is your soon to be husband. I believe that settles it." He said calmly.

Mori began to chant once again in Aleph. The Senshi were quietly whispering to themselves, wondering just what was going on. Chibi-Usa was screaming at the smiling brick wall named Neko and Hotaru was curled up in Mordred's lap giggling at something he whispered into her ear. Mamoru and Usagi on the other hand were still in shock. They badly wanted to yell and scream right along with Chibi-Usa. Arranged marriages went out in the nineteenth century, but they both had the sneaking suspicion that there was nothing they could do.

"Elios!" Mori screamed in conclusion to his chant.

The Senshi looked around expecting to see a bishonen boy with a little golden horn on his head. They were greatly mistaken. What appeared in the middle of the room was a tall powerful man in golden armour. A large western style broadsword hung in a scabbard on his belt. He was built like the Greek statues of Heracles. Makoto, Rei and even Mina had to wipe a little drool off their chins at this sight of him.

"Mori-sama," he said with deep respect, "you have called so have I answered."

"Ahh Elios, I am so happy to finally see the only remaining descendent of the Earryn line. How are you young friend?" Mori asked.

"I am well Mori-sama. How may I serve you?"

"I wish to know how the charge I gave your family is." Elios wilted at the question. It was obvious that Mori already knew the answer, but he had to play this out.

"I no longer have the Stone in my possession, my lord. My grandfather chose to pass the stone on to King Thoresus of The Isle of Solitude. In my time I have done as my grandfather ordered and released it to the reincarnation of his twenty fifth great grandson Endymion."

"So you have broken the trust?"

"Not I my lord, but my ancestors."

"I see, and do you know what will happen to your family without its energies? Have you never questioned why you are so much weaker than your grandfather was?"

"I suspect my families powers will fade until we become mortal. Only one other family besides my own and the Lunari line survive, to my knowledge, and they found it necessary to abandon this plane to survive."

"I understand. I will fix the error your ancestor made. You will be only lightly punished for continuing a tradition you knew was wrong. Do you accept that I am your ancestral Lord, Elios of clan Earryn?"

"Yes my lord."

"Good, then like any good lord, I have seen to your comfort. I have selected for you a bride, her price has been met and the wedding will take place on her mothers twentieth birthday."

"My lord that makes no sense. If her mother is only twenty she must be a child. You wouldn't have me marry a child would you my lord?"

"Oh no, in fact she looks to only be a year or so younger than her mother, she's from the future." Mori said with a smile.

"You don't mean?"

"Oh yes. Elios of clan Earryn, meet your bride to be, Chibi-Usagi of clan Lunari."

"Masaka." The two betrotheds said in unison before fainting.

********

An hour later, after teleporting Chibi-Usa, Mamoru, and Usagi to Mamoru's apartment and the Outers back to their own home, only Ami, Makoto, Mina and Rei remained. The argument still hadn't abated even with the cause having left.

"You can't make them marry." Rei argued at Mori and Neko. "This is the Twentieth Century, we don't do things like that anymore."

"Rei in my time that wasn't just common practice, it was expected, and as I am still alive, it is still my time." Mori finished with aplomb.

"Errr you are impossible!" she screamed. "Mina, tell him he can't do this." She begged

"But Rei, they already did, and besides, did you see how Chibi-Usa looked at him. It was so cute."

"Yea Rei," Makoto agreed, "she didn't look very opposed to the idea after she saw him. I thought he was just a little kid, but he sure grew up fast."

"He wasn't a little kid. He's a shapeshifter like Neko and I. When he was trying to win Chibi-Usa's trust he appeared as someone her own age. You did notice his unicorn form was fully mature didn't you?"

"Yes," Ami said, "but I never realised that he might be able to change his appearance within his Humanoid and Eques forms."

"What do you really look like?" Rei said looking at both of the Primarchs.

"Uhh, that's a good question." Mori said.

"Yea, do you mean what do I look like now or what?" Neko asked.

"What do you really look like? What is your true appearance?"

"You know, that's a harder question to answer than you think. We don't have a 'true' appearance."

"Oh come on you have to look like something." Makoto interjected.

"Well, in the first instant of my awareness I looked like this." Mori said as he disappeared. Only the glow that usually surrounded him remained. It was far brighter than usual, making looking at him difficult. "~Now, I know you can't see me,~" He continued telepathically, "~but I'm actually still in the same place. My physical existence is currently far smaller than a quark right now. This is no more my true appearance though than this is.~"

Where there was only a glow moments ago now a small obviously carnivorous dinosaur stood. It quickly became a bird, which morphed into a cat, then an enormous praying mantis like thing and then into the small golden dragon they had seen before. It blew a short jet of flame and reverted to Mori.

"As you can see, I don't have a true appearance."

"Nor do I." The panther sized housecat sitting in Ami's lap responded.

"Ok, why do you look like you do?" Mina asked.

"Oh Mina-chan. If I can look like anything I want, why shouldn't I be attractive? I refuse to be average in anything." Everyone blushed at the implications.

"Ok, I think I've had enough for one day." Rei said. "I'm going home now."

"Hey, wait for me." Makoto said as she hopped up and followed the Miko towards the door. "I don't want to hang around here with just them, they get hentai." Everyone laughed as the two girls left.

"So, shall we do our language lesson for the day?" Ami asked as soon as the door closed.

"Actually, we came up with a better idea. Hold still Ami." Mori sat down and pulled Mina into his lap mimicking Neko's actions. The boys gently took hold of their girlfriends head and began to lightly trace complex symbols with their fingers.

"This may be mildly unpleasant." Mori said with apology in his voice. "But it's the only way either of us have come up with to teach you Aleph in less than twenty years."

"What are you going to do?" Ami asked worriedly.

"Remember when I probed your mind Ami-chan?" When she nodded he continued. "Were going to do the opposite this time. I'm going to put all my knowledge of Aleph into your brain as quickly as I can get your mind to absorb it. Like Mori said this might be less than pleasant, we've never done this before."

"Wait I don't think this is a good id." The transfer had already begun.

********

"So Rei, what should we do about Crystal Tokyo?" Makoto said as they got out of the elevator.

"There's nothing we can do. It's gone. You know Setsuna wouldn't have sent Chibi-Usa back without a good reason, and she didn't give her a key this time. There's no going back for her."

"Wow, I don't really know what to feel. On one hand I loved the idea of how peaceful it was supposed to be."

"But on the other, the cost might have been too terrible to imagine." Rei finished. "I think the Primarchs are wrong. I believe we could make it work, but Usagi has given up. She surrendered the dream in there Makoto. It's gone."

"Not like she had any choice." Makoto snorted as she pushed open the door to the outside. "All of us together couldn't stop one of them, and there are five Primarchs."

"We can stop one. I have the Moon Sword. You saw what it did to Mori."

"Rei I want you to give that back to Mina, you have no idea how dangerous it would be to try to hit him with that thing. He killed Haruka, Ami told me. She picked up the sword and he killed her for it. Neko had to bring her back."

"Maybe." She said.

Rei turned around to look back at the building where not only her Prince, but also the Primarchs lived. She couldn't see Mori or Mamoru's balconies from this side, but Neko's was easily visible. Something caught her eye a few floors down from the penthouse. She could see a glint of metal as someone moved through a fast kata with a sword. She looked carefully at the lightly muscled man and felt a strange sense of déjà vu. He had short blond hair and light skin, but his features were lost in the distance. She couldn't suppress a shiver though looking at him. Something was very wrong.

End Chapter 8